Design

Max Easy Chair

The plumpy and rubber-looking chair was designed in collaboration between Blå Station and Johan Ansander based on another chair, the Maximus. This iteration of the design sees greater variety in colours and departs from its original timber material to moulded foam. You can read more about the chair here.

Kajsa Melchior

Stockholm-based furniture designer and sculptor Kajsa Melchior “investigates the borderlands between furniture and sculpture”. This exploration of the two functions is clear in her series of furniture designs which highlight natural imperfections. The furniture pieces give the impression that they were extracted directly from a volcano and were re-shaped and given a new function.

Laura Kjær

Laura Kjær plays with colourful techniques in her Super Superficial chair.

Funct Feast at Stockholm Design Week

Funct Feast was an art exhibit curated for Stockholm Design Week which sought to highlight functional art pieces that blur the lines between art and furniture.

In a similar vein to Kajsa, the pieces in this exhibit all have an artistic composition in their form and materials but are extremely inviting, promoting interaction between the audience and the piece. A sculpture will have surfaces that ask to either hold an object or a person.

You can read more details about the exhibit and see more images here.

Architecture

Project Neom and Its Controversies

Project Neom is mostly associated with its biggest project, The Line, where the aim is to build an entire city in a single linear structure that stretches 170 kilometres. However, Project Neom involves 10 different projects that come under the initiative of Saudi Arabia’s crown prince Mohammed bin Salman.

This project is filled with controversies that have caused debates in the design industry as to the ethical implications of architecture firms that are involved in the massive project.

So far, there have been documented instances of forced displacement of 20,000 members of the Huwaitat tribe in order to make space for Project Neom. One of the tribe’s members, Abdul Rahim al-Huwaiti was a leading voice in attempting to alert the world about the forced evictions through videos posted online. Soon after posting the videos online Abdul Rahim al-Huwaiti was killed by Saudi Security Forces for allegedly having opened fire against them.

Furthermore, from a design perspective, the project promotes a further hegemony of visual language in the architectural world by creating yet another shiny and reflective monolith covered in glass.

Tom Ravenscroft outlines all of the controversies involved in this project in this article for Dezeen.

Nick Fletcher Labels Accessibility as a Socialist Concept

Nick Fletcher is a Torie MP who has had his share of controversies as well as attacks on perceived socialist agenda items. His latest target has been the 15-minute city framework developed by scientist Carlos Moreno.

The 15-minute framework for urban development is simple: The services and utilities necessary for daily life should be accessible within a 15-minute walk or bike ride from any point in a city. The aims of this framework strive to lower dependency on motor vehicles, increase accessibility to all inhabitants and promote a healthy community and local economy.

However, Fletcher sees the 15-minute city as another progressive agenda item that seeks to remove the freedom of choice from inhabitants by constraining them within a certain perimeter. “Fletcher called for a ‘debate on the international socialist concept of so-called 15-minute cities and 20-minute neighbourhoods’.”

You can read more here.